A motion to authorize the German police to spy on internet users without legal permission has been met with widespread criticism. The move, aiding the 'fight against terrorism', has divided the country's grand coalition as it proposes that the police pool their resources with the secret services towards the cause.
"We have had a history of not brining the secret service possibilities and the police together. We have always kept that divided. This new law is trying to bring that together…and we strongly oppose that," deputy Markus Loening from the Free Democratic Party (FDP) told Press TV's Stefan Herrmann in Berlin.
The motion proposes absolute authority for the Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA) to search through the personal computers with the 'remote forensic software' which retrieves questionable information.
The trade unionists are not likely to react positively to the plan so far rejected by the German public and two police unions that described it as 'aggressive'.
Hendrik Zoerner, from the German Union of Journalists, said the law undermined the journalists' right to withhold evidence as they can be forced into revealing their sources.
"Since 9/11, the security architecture has changed dramatically in Germany just as it has in the UK and the US. It is all subject to more surveillance, more control and the civic opposition is quite normal," academician Ulrich Battis from the Humboldt University in Berlin told Press TV.
http://www.presstv.ir/Detail.aspx?id=76138§ionid=351020604
Topic: German police to cyber-spy on terrorists (Read 377 times)